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8 Responses to Who can get the other’s states? and kudos katie

It’s not very important who can get the other’s states so much as it is who can get the remaining important states like Texas, Pennsylvania and North Carolina. I think it may be impossible to say from these results who would fair better in the general election and vis-a-vis McCain because we have no idea who each voter’s second choice is. So, if Obama gets the nomination, it is possible that some Hillary voters would vote for McCain over Obama or not vote at all.

A couple other things to note: (1). Obama won in Missouri, a bellwether state, but lost all of the counties in southern Missouri, the bible belt county where the election is supposedly decided (so say the talking heads); (2). Hillary’s victories in CA, NJ, and MA are by a wide margin and these states carry lots of delegates so she won where she needed to; and (3). Hillary was the highly preferred candidate for low income Americans (>$35,000/year) and Obama’s best income bracket was $150K-$200K.

Obama took more votes from Clinton in NY than she did from him in Illinois. His margins of victory in the Midwest and South were huge–20, even 30 points–, while hers over him in NJ, NY, and CA were all within 10 points. A lot of the margin in CA came from absentee ballots that were cast right after NH’s primary and before SC. It is way too strange a primary election season to draw firm conclusions about relative strengths and weaknesses here. We have to see what happens over the next month as strategies unfold and states that were supposed to have held no importance now become crucial to the hopes of both sides. It could even go as late as May (ha! ha! go Indiana!) but at least we can be happy for the TX Dems who tried to move their primary up to yesterday and were prevented from doing so by the TX Rs. Now they could well end up picking the nominee. Whoever said that Clinton would win on the coasts and Obama would take the “flyover” states came close to getting it absolutely right–except that Clinton took OK (military vote) and Obama won Connecticut (antiwar liberals still pissed that they’re stuck with Lieberman, now joyriding on McCain’s campaign plane).

1) It was me and Katie against the class who said Clinton would hold CA (she was not alone). I never doubted the awesome strength of her CA political machine.

2) If my Clinton bias seeps through I just want it to be clarified that she was not my original choice – John Edwards all the way! [laura beth I’m still hurting from you yesterday suggesting I supported Giuliani – that’s just mean]

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Q week ago I suggested that Clinton would take the coasts and Obama the flyover states – I’m not so sure if that trend will continue. As Vicky points out, Clinton held CA largely because of absentee voters who voted before the Obama surge. At the end of the day, Obama’s biggest obstacle thus far has been proving he was viable. That should no longer be a problem. Now that he broke even with Clinton on SuperTuesday, and has established his legitimacy as a national candidate, I don’t see how Clinton can stop his momentum.

The calender for the next month favors him as does fundraising. I never thought I’d say this but at a minimum, he’s right now the odds on favorite.

Indeed, I was quite wrong to call CA for Obama. I think all parties in this discussion have made some excellent points. The bottom line is that whoever wins the Democratic nod will need support from independents and Republicans, most of whom didn’t get a say last night. So I’m unsure we can say from looking at maps whether Obama or Clinton is more electable. For me, the huge disgust with Hillary (mostly among GOPers) is reason enough that Obama would make a more electable candidate. Frank Rich, in the NYT on Sundays, has argued this point brilliantly. One could argue, though, that this line of thinking is how Dems got Kerry in ’04.

Yes Ben you did call Hil for CA. When I said, “you were for mcCain?!?!” I said it with incredulty if you recall because I thought it could not be right. The class discussion was not very ordered at that point (what horrible prof would let a class get so out of control!?!?!?!)

I would also like to add that the first vote I ever cast for a US president was in 1988, in the primaries, when I asked for the democrat ballot, the poll worker told my mom, “don’t worry she will grow out of it!”, and cast my vote for Jessis Jackson. (luckily, instead of me growing out of it, my mom grew IN to it.)

It takes a while to figure out how to be in politics and support a candidate that is not your first choice. I loved Kucinich, I loved Edwards, I love Barack, and if it comes to it, I will love Hillary. But I love hanging out with people who have the enthusaism of convictins, hope, and youth!

That was a nice comment. 🙂
Nick Kristof’s column tomorrow is apropos of your entry above:http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/07/opinion/07kristof.html
It’s interesting stuff, though I’d argue Kristof takes this a little too far (and I tend to agree with the flaws he points out in his own argument.)

Prediction markets have swung back to about ~60% for Obama, presumably on the strength of his expected advantage in being able to go on TV in the remaining states, and his seeming advantage in the next two primaries.